BACKGROUND

What is sustainable development?

In the late 1980's the concept of sustainable development was introduced into the environmental debate as an expression of the interdependence between economic development, the natural environment and people. The most widely accepted definition of sustainable development, presented in the report Our Common Future, describes it as "development that meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs and aspirations".

Sustainable development is said to incorporate three components of the environment: social; economic; and biophysical, and has been illustrated in the diagram on the right (source: after Bartelmus, 1997):

The data, indicators and supporting statistical systems on both the economy and society are well developed in South Africa. Gross Domestic Product (GDP), unemployment levels, inflation rates, life expectancy and literacy rates are accepted indicators of various economic and social aspects of life, and in most cases good quality long-term data is available to support these indicators. However, statistical systems supporting information on the biophysical environment are lacking. In addition, the areas of overlap between the economic, social and biophysical components is the area where information and data are most scarce.

Although it is recognised that information on all three components of sustainable development are required to measure progress towards sustainable development, the scope of the National Environmental Indicators Programme was to develop indicators specifically for the biophysical environment component.